


The way to a Thief's heart...

by Azureflowers



Category: Persona 5
Genre: M/M, Secret Santa, this is silly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-01
Updated: 2018-01-01
Packaged: 2019-02-26 02:06:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13225905
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Azureflowers/pseuds/Azureflowers
Summary: ...is paved by good intentions and poor communication. And possibly some chocolate.





	The way to a Thief's heart...

**Author's Note:**

> (So this is how I kick off the new year...)
> 
> I was part of the wonderful Mishima Secret Santa event! The creative process was quite different from what I'm used to, so it definitely was...a learning experience. I'm kind of tempted to write an omake where they talk things out a bit but for the time being, this is what it's gonna be - a completely out-of-place Valentine's day story for a Christmas event posted on New Year's day. Go figure.

When the school day ended on a chilly February afternoon, the atmosphere was excited. Groups of girls hunched over bakery magazines and blogs, chattering quietly and occasionally letting out excited squeals. Guys mostly put on a brave face and pretended they weren’t dying to know the names muttered in soft voices or written in notebook margins.

It was the 13th of February, the eve of Valentine’s day. Many young people would be busy with making chocolate-flavoured treats that evening, and even more would dream of being able to receive some of those lovingly crafted tokens of affection.

Yuuki Mishima was different. He had already spent the previous evening in the kitchen, melting and stirring the ingredients, nearly burning his hand on boiling butter a couple times, agonizing over the texture for ages and once starting completely from scratch after deciding the lumpy mess he had ended up with was beyond saving.

'With the fruit of his labours safely tucked away in his bag, Yuuki left the classroom and made for the library. He passed the counter where the librarian sat browsing a cookbook, and took a seat in the corner. The library was less crowded than usual, since most third-year students had already taken their entrance exams and even those who were still studying seemed to prefer to take a day off.

After about twenty minutes of fiddling with his phone, Yuuki was fairly sure that the route would already be safe. He left the library and maintained a purposefully leisurely pace as he walked back to the corridor where the third-year classrooms were. He opened the door of one of the classrooms and let out a relieved sigh when he found it empty. It would have been easy enough to just say that he had accidentally entered the wrong class, but he was glad he didn’t have to resort to such excuses.

It wasn’t his class. It was the homeroom of Ryuji Sakamoto.

When Kurusu was locked away to the juvenile hall towards the end of their second schoolyear, Sakamoto had taken over the role of Yuuki’s primary link to the Phantom Thieves group. They mostly talked about how to get Kurusu free again, and Yuuki had assumed that was what Sakamoto was after. But even when Kurusu walked free and returned to his hometown, Sakamoto would keep hanging out with Yuuki. It became routine for them to go running together every Sunday morning and sometimes after school. The first few times had dealt a heavy blow to Yuuki’s dignity: he hadn’t exercised that much since he had traded the volleyball club for managing the PhanSite while Sakamoto had kept training with Kurusu in the real world as well as the cognitive one, so they were on a totally different level. However, Sakamoto didn’t make fun of him when Yuuki ran out of stamina and began wheezing and huffing. Instead, he would just point to a spot at a distance and say,

“We’ll take a break when we get to that bench. C’mon, final dash!”

No matter how exhausted he felt, those words of encouragement always made Yuuki grit his teeth and start running again despite his aching feet and the sharp pain in his side. When he all but collapsed after making it to the designated goal, Sakamoto would fetch some cold drinks from a nearby vending machine and hand it to Yuuki with a lopsided grin, congratulating him that he had once again made it a bit further than last time. It was so different from Kamoshida’s reign of terror.

Yuuki had always admired Sakamoto for his tenacity and ability to speak his mind. During his first year, when he was just beginning to discover the ugly side of Shujin Academy’s sports programme, he had watched in awe as Sakamoto refused to bend to Kamoshida’s will. But after seeing how that had ended – Sakamoto’s athletic future flushed down the drain as Kamoshida faced no repercussions whatsoever – Yuuki had retroactively branded Sakamoto as a fool who didn’t know when to give in. However, after Kurusu had appeared and the wheels of change had begun to turn, Yuuki suddenly started spending more time with Sakamoto and found that the admiration he had felt in the past had just been hiding under the surface, now coming back in full force.

However, not everything was the same. Sometimes Yuuki caught himself thinking about wanting to touch or kiss Sakamoto in the strangest moments, wishing Sakamoto was there to keep him company when he was feeling lonely, being unreasonably happy when Sakamoto sent him a video clip of a dog trying to catch soap bubbles. The symptoms were far from unusual, and after some late nights of brutally honest introspection (and some research on various internet forums just to be sure), Yuuki had a name for what he was experiencing.

Of course, he had no intention to actually voice any of those feelings to Sakamoto. He was already quite happy being able to just be friends, and the risk of Sakamoto not accepting true feelings was too great. Even if Sakamoto would be okay with dating a guy, it would be better if it was someone like Kurusu. Sometimes when they talked about the leader of the Phantom Thieves, Sakamoto would get this look in his eyes…

Yuuki shook the intrusive thoughts away. That line of thinking never led to anywhere constructive, and he had a mission to fulfill. It was the answer he had reached: a compromise between wanting to make Sakamoto happy while not revealing his secret.

Since they still were put in different classes for their final year, Yuuki had needed to do some research to be able to figure out Sakamoto’s desk. Now he had memorized it so that he could walk to it without a moment’s hesitation. After double-checking the correct position, he finally took a deep breath and took the special item from his bag.

It was a heart-shaped piece of handmade chocolate, carefully wrapped in very cute patterned gift paper, with a small pink ribbon on top to complete the package. Yuuki had researched a lot of pastel-coloured websites to come up with the perfect manifestation of cuteness. The end result was what most people would call a pretty successful Valentine’s day gift: something that any guy would be happy to receive.

Well, that was the point. Just a little something from a secret admirer to bring some excitement to what was usually a pretty bleak event for them both. Sakamoto would find the gift in his desk in the morning, so maybe he would come to wave it in Yuuki’s face during lunchtime, and Yuuki would pretend to be astonished by the news. If he had any luck, maybe he would get to see Sakamoto eat the actual chocolate…

Suddenly, the classroom door was opened. Yuuki’s head snapped up to discover that the worst possible person had just entered the room…at the worst possible time. Sakamoto took a double-take when he noticed Yuuki was standing _right_ next to his desk.

“Mishima…? Uh…I’m pretty sure this was the…” Sakamoto’s voice trailed off as he checked that he was indeed in the correct classroom before turning his eyes back to Yuuki – more specifically, the colourful package. “What’s that?”

Yuuki hurriedly tried to cover little card announcing Sakamoto as the recipient, but he was too late, and the fact he was in this classroom at this time made it woefully obvious what he was there for.

Surely there were a dozen ways to get around this. He could just say he had found the chocolate somewhere and wondered whose it was, that he had been asked a favour by some shy first-year who couldn’t muster the courage to deliver the gift herself, that it was some new fad for guys to give ridiculously cute chocolates to their friends as a joke… Any number of more or less plausible explanations flashed through Yuuki’s mind, but he couldn’t bring himself to actually verbalise any of them. Instead, he looked at his feet as he mumbled,

“You…seemed so upset that you didn’t get anything last year, so…”

Wow. Now that he said it out loud, it sounded terrible. Sure enough, when Yuuki dared to glance at Sakamoto’s face to see his reaction, he was devastated by the amount of raw hurt he saw in the other’s eyes. Sakamoto’s hands tightened into fists as he quietly said,

“So you throw me a bone out of pity. _Great_.”

“That’s…that’s not it, I swear! I really wanted to give you something-“

“What’s up with the secrecy then?” Sakamoto cut him off, “Just give it normally…”

Sakamoto probably would have preferred a simple approach: having Yuuki offer the chocolates in person and getting a chance to turn him down immediately. There, nice and easy. Sakamoto was straightforward like that, so it was no wonder this roundabout plan probably left a bad taste in his mouth.

“I…didn’t want you to think I’m creepy…B-but I, won’t blame you if you don’t feel…comfortable with me anymore after this…”

“Wait wait wait wait, hold up. What was that?”

The complete change of tone in Sakamoto’s voice made Yuuki raise his head again. Now he was met with question marks written all over the other’s face.

“What makes you think I’d be creeped out?” Sakamoto asked with no hint of sarcasm in his voice. As if he was genuinely confused.

“Uh…because a guy who’s supposed to be your friend is trying to trick you into eating his handmade chocolate on Valentine’s day?”

Before Yuuki had time to regret blurting out those words, Sakamoto’s face turned red all the way up to his bleached hairline.

“Dude…you made that?” he pointed at the package Yuuki was still awkwardly holding. Without waiting for a reply, he reached out and Yuuki had no choice but to hand the gift over, albeit a bit reluctantly.

Sakamoto glanced at the name tag as if there was still a possibility it wasn’t his name that was written there. Then he very gently pulled at the ribbon and began to peel off the wrapping. Yuuki was fascinated by the careful movements: he had imagined Sakamoto to tear into presents like a little kid, but now he saw Sakamoto actually twitch when he accidentally ripped the edge of the delicate paper.

When Sakamoto eventually revealed the heart-shaped sweet and took a tentative bite, Yuuki’s self-consciousness flared.

“Um, I know you don’t really care for sweet stuff so… You don’t have to finish it.”

“Are you kidding me. This is…the best thing I ever ate. Like, ramen tier,” Sakamoto mumbled before taking another bite.

When it came to Sakamoto’s expressions, Yuuki had long ago decided that his favourite was the confident grin that never failed to make his knees weak. But looking at the infamous troublemaker now – quietly munching on chocolate as the gold-tinted light of the setting sun illuminated his flushed face – this wasn’t too bad, either.


End file.
